Abigail's Secret
by BlackthornChef
Summary: At Hogwarts a studious fifth-year Ravenclaw spends every waking moment studying. It doesn't matter that her classmates hardly notice her. Because soon she will accomplish something that will impress her family and professors to no end. She will become an Animagus.
1. Chapter 1

At first glance, the ground appeared deserted. Dumbledore scanned the grounds one more time before turning and heading back to his study to finish grading the fifth years' essays on the Laws of Transfiguration. If he hadn't been so preoccupied with the piles of papers that needed to be graded before the morning, he might have noticed the small fifth year girl dozing off at the base of the Whomping Willow after curfew.

Long after Dumbledore had returned to his office, Abigail awoke with a start. Her eyes darting around the darkened and deserted grounds the girl sighed. This wasn't the first time she had fallen asleep at the base of the giant ferocious tree and missed curfew. For a moment anger and exasperation flashed through her – she may not have friends here but surely someone would have the courtesy to wake up a fellow student as curfew approached. The feelings passed as quickly as they had come. Her entire life had been spent with people acting as if she were invisible. A year or two ago she just decided to stop being bitter about it. Bitterness did nothing for her except distract her from her studies. As a dutiful Ravenclaw she couldn't stand to let precious time be wasted with pitying herself.

Speaking of time, the girl looked down at her wristwatch (a gift from her brother and one of the few Muggle technologies that worked at Hogwarts) to find that it was one o'clock in the morning. She sighed again and stole a look at the castle. If curfew had just passed she may have been able to sneak back into the castle without too many questions. But at one in the morning? The annoying old groundskeeper would have cast his Caterwauling Charm over the entrance by now.

She had found out about the charm the hard way two months ago when she was in a very similar situation. As punishment she had gotten a month's worth of Saturday detentions that was spent cleaning the schools bathrooms. Shuddering at the memory, Abigail turned back to the base of the old tree. Another night in the shack then. She silently thanked Mrs. Norris again for finding this place. She bent down and began crawling through the small passageway until she got to the abandoned shack.

Shortly after getting caught sneaking into the school after curfew, Abigail had found this place. Correction, her cat (and only friend) led her to the secret passageway beneath the Whomping Willow. It had been a cool October night one week after she was caught for breaking curfew. She had fallen asleep under the shade of her favorite tree by the lake again and awoke to the dreadful thoughts of cleaning more bathrooms. In desperation she had woken her cat, Mrs. Norris, to voice their predicament in the hopes that somehow by saying it allowed she would be able to find a solution.

After Abigail's near hysteric rehash of the situation, Mrs. Norris looked calmly up at her, then towards the castle, then back to Abigail, before turning to stare at the Whomping Willow. Releasing a single meow, Mrs. Norris stalked off towards the tree. Although startled and confused, Abigail still had the sense to follow her intelligent cat as she made her way across the grounds to the giant willow. Mrs. Norris darted in between the wildly swinging branches and hit a notch on the trunk. All of a sudden the willow froze and Abigail was able to walk safely to the base of the tree. There she finally caught up to her cat and they looked at each other for a moment. Then, with another meow, Mrs. Norris slipped through a small opening in the trunk and seemingly disappeared. It was obvious that Abigail was meant to follow so, trusting her cat wholeheartedly, she slipped through the opening.

The space under the tree was much larger and longer than what Abigail had anticipated. Spotting Mrs. Norris halfway down the passageway, Abigail rushed forward, crawling most of the way. After what felt like an hour, the passage ended and Abigail stood up in an abandoned shack. Though not very big, the shack did have a few small, albeit barren, rooms perfect for spending the night in. Abigail snuggled up with Mrs. Norris in one of the less drafty rooms and slept the rest of the night away, avoiding both frostbite and detention. Ever since then Abigail made use of the shack whenever necessary and she thanked her friend every time for it.

She couldn't thank her friend tonight, however. Two weeks ago her dearest friend died and the pain was still too much to bear. Abigail tried shaking off the tendrils of sadness curling around her heart but only managed to keep the pain at bay until she reached her favorite room in the shack. Not able to hold back anymore, she sat down on the floor and released a few tears for her lost friend. After she cried herself out for the night, Abigail pulled herself over to the pile of blankets and wiped her eyes dry. The room looked a lot different from that first night. After telling her brother about her new sanctuary he sent over a ton of blankets and some small things to decorate the room with. The only thing still in its original place in the room was a large ornate mirror that was so beautiful Abigail couldn't bear to move it.

It was while staring into this mirror that Abigail began debating with herself. Should she go ahead and sleep? Or should she continue studying transfiguration? She silently laughed to herself, there was no debate. Her first class tomorrow was at nine. She set her watch to go off at seven and pulled _The Art of the Animagus: From Theory to Practice_ from her bag. There were only three more chapters until she was done with the book. So close, she was so close. After two years of studying Abigail had read everything but three chapters about Animagi. Tomorrow she would be able to start attempting the practical portion of the magic. Thinking of this she settled down to read. Four hours later, she groggily closed the book and collapsed into the blankets.


	2. Chapter 2

Abigail groaned as she hit her watch in a halfhearted attempt to silence the incessant beeping telling her to wake up. Still, she knew she had to get out of bed. Squinting her eyes against the bright light filtering in form the boarded up windows, she stood up and stretched. Grabbing her bag, Abigail made her way back through the passage. Before exiting the tree she cast a disillusionment charm over herself, chuckling at how she was now doubly invisible. Relatively few people were out about this early in the morning but Abigail was still very cautious not to run into anyone.

Once she had gotten back into the castle, Abigail ducked into an empty classroom to reverse the disillusionment charm. Racing up to Ravenclaw tower, now just normally invisible, she noticed she had just over half an hour to get ready and get to potions. Miraculously she made it, with just a few seconds to spare. The rest of the school day she spent either in class or doing homework. After her last class of the day, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Abigail rushed back to the shack. It was the only place she felt comfortable practicing. Since she made herself invisible every time she entered the passageway she figured no one would walk in on her. She rolled her eyes at the memory of many a spell ruined by another Ravenclaw searching for an empty classroom. Practically all the rooms near the tower had been claimed. Stealing someone's practice room was practically an open declaration of war. Abigail was thankful for the room yet again, this time for the fact that she had a nice quiet place to study.

Finally reaching her room, Abigail put her bag down and took a deep breath. She took a moment to run through the steps for becoming an Animagus. After this and another deep breath she felt ready to begin. She focused on her soul animal, closed her eyes and whispered the incantation. She looked down and opened her eyes. Ugh, feet. Examining the rest of her body she found that the only thing out of place was what seemed like a whisker on her face. She muttered the incantation to return to human form and the whisker disappeared. Closing her eyes and concentrating, she tried again. This time she had three whiskers on each side of her face. After muttering the reverse incantation the whiskers disappeared once again.

Five long hours passed like this, each attempt getting progressively better. At least for the first four and a half hours. The last half hour brought no improvement, just the same weird cat-human mutant _thing_ every time she tried. She started to get impatient and frustrated with herself about her lack of improvement in the last thirty minutes. She had studied this for two years! She knew every theory and rule behind becoming an Animagus! Gathering up all her anger and scrunching up her eyes, Abigail practically shouted the spell. All of a sudden a bright flash of pain went throughout her entire body and then focused in her head. The pain disappeared almost as fast as it had come so she didn't give much thought to it. Looking around the room, she realized excitedly that everything was much larger. Sauntering over to the mirror on the floor to examine herself, Abigail was certain she had gotten it perfect. She let out a joyful meow as she stared the cat in the mirror. She had done it. Abigail Filch was an Animagus.

Abigail, now as a beautiful dark brown cat with streaks of light brown and blonde, rushed around the room testing her animal form. Years of preparation had led up to this moment and she knew all the time was worth it. She raced to and fro though the shack and thoroughly enjoying her feline agility. It was quite a while before she noticed that night quickly falling. Despite her love of the old shack, it was not the most comfortable place to sleep and she didn't want to miss curfew yet again. Abigail hurried back to the room to grab her stuff so she could head up to the castle. Before leaving though, she closed her eyes and said the reverse incantation in her mind.

Opening her eyes, Abigail's stomach filled with dread. Nothing had changed. She was still a cat. She tried not to worry too much. Maybe she hadn't concentrated hard enough? She scrunched her cat face up and tried again. Still nothing. After seven or eight more tries she allowed herself to panic. Although she had read about multiple cases of transfigurations gone wrong, she never expected it to happen to her. Abigail Filch was much too brilliant to make such a grave error. Then she thought back to the momentary pain when she first transformed. Why was she so blind!? That was a blatant sign that something was wrong.

After panicking for another moment she realized what she had to do. She had to get Professor Dumbledore, he would know what to do. Not only was he the professor of Transfiguration, he was also the kindest professor by a landslide. Not to mention one of the most brilliant and powerful wizards alive (at least according to _Notable Magical Names of Our Time_). Abigail knew if anybody could reverse her mistake it would be him. Abandoning her stuff as it was now of no use to her, she dashed through the passageway, across the grounds and into the castle. Luckily the groundskeeper hadn't set his charm up yet; Abigail wanted as few people to know about her predicament as possible.

In a matter of moments she arrived at the slightly ajar door to Dumbledore's office. Quickly sending up a prayer, Abigail burst into the room. Dumbledore was so immersed in his papers that he didn't notice the cat standing next to his desk. Although Abigail was normally quite timid, she realized this situation called for drastic measures. She meowed. Startled by the noise, Dumbledore looked down. Upon seeing the cat, a look of warmth replaced the shock that had been on his face.

"Well what do we have here?" Dumbledore chuckled as he bent down to pet her behind the ears. "How did you wander here by yourself? Did one of the students leave you outside?"

Abigail had forgotten that many of the students had cats just like her. She rolled her eyes, shook her head and jumped onto his desk. He smiled and reached forward to pet her again but she meowed fiercely and took a firm step back. Apparently he didn't get the hint because he just reached further and continued scratching her behind the ears. Although it felt surprisingly good she couldn't get distracted. With all of her might she tried to communicate what had happened with her eyes. It kind of worked.

"Such intense eyes for a kitten." Still wasn't enough for him to realize she was a student. Looking down at his desk gave her an idea. The papers now strewn across his desk were the fifth years' essays that had recently been handed in. Ironically, and luckily, the essays were about the processes involved in becoming an Animagus. Abigail began nosing through them to find hers. Dumbledore tried stopping her a few times, seeing as she was making a horrible mess, but she hissed and meowed until he let her continue. Finally she found it, happily noting the perfect mark she received. She separated it from the rest, placing it right in front of Dumbledore, and meowed again. He glanced down at the paper, obviously not getting the significance.

"Now why would you go through all that trouble to pull out one paper? You can't keep it you know." She rolled her eyes and looked at the paper. To help him understand, Abigail hit her name with her paw a few times, then looked up meaningfully up at him.

"Abigail Filch? You're Abigail's cat?" At least he was getting close. She shook her head no, meowed, and looked back at the paper. Now she hit the word "Animagus" A couple times.

"Animagus? Wait! You _are_ Abigail." Thank goodness Dumbledore was clever. She meowed sadly and looked down. "Well congratulations on your transfiguration! That's some fine magic. My guess though, is that you're having a little trouble reversing the spell?" Although flattered by Dumbledore's compliments, Abigail's pride was still in pieces over her inability to reverse it.

"Now lets see…" Dumbledore though for a moment. "Okay, get off the desk. I've got some spells to try." She hopped off the desk and onto the floor, confident in Dumbledore's ability to change her back. That confidence started shrinking after twenty spells and no results. It shrank to near nothingness after he said, "Dear me, this is troublesome." Something that was troublesome for _Dumbledore_? Once again she was filled with dread.

"Hmmm… I'm afraid we're going to have to go see the headmaster. Is that alright with you?" Abigail nodded solemnly and trudged towards the door. The sad look in Dumbledore's eyes did nothing to reassure her. So the two hurried to the headmaster's office, the worst case scenario floating though both of their minds.


End file.
